The suspects are said to be members of a violent new terror group said to be planning bomb attacks in Muslim countries

Officials have said it could be up to two months before new, more sophisticated equipment will be in the water to help the search for flight MH370 across what will be largely unmapped ocean floor.

The hunt for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane that disappeared on March 8 carrying 239 people was scaled back last week after coming up with nothing, despite an air and sea search of 4.64 million square kilometres of the southern Indian Ocean.

Australia on Monday hosted a meeting in Canberra with the transport ministers of Malaysia and China to determine the way forward, which will focus on an intensified undersea search.

1:17 am

More here from Larry King on CNN's coverage of MH370.

CNN has covered the story extensively since the Malaysia Airlines plane went missing en route to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur on March 8 with 239 people on board.

A recent CNN report said the Malaysian authorities “have nothing to show” from the exhaustive search that has so far covered more than 4.6 million square kilometres of the Indian Ocean.

However, King, who fronted CNN’s Larry King Live for 25 years, said: “The funny thing about it is that in all this time the only thing we know is that it made a left turn.

“We don’t know anything else, so I have learned nothing, and all that coverage has led to nothing.”

The bespectacled newsman added: “While it gave them better ratings, they weren’t doing what I consider great news work, which is letting the audience determine what is news.

“In that same period of time (since MH370 went missing) they had landslides in Washington, they had the ferry boat in South Korea, they had Ukraine, they had the G.M. recall with 13 people killed, and they are leading with the missing plane.”

11:40 pm

Veteran US TV host Larry King has slammed CNN’s “absurd” coverage of the disappearance of Flight MH370.

The 80-year-old hit out at his former employer in an interview with the Capital New York website.

King said: “I miss being live, which I did all my life and I miss the big story, though I will tell you, I am glad I am not on CNN now with this missing plane.

“Because that has been turned into the most absurd news story.

“It was a great news story and then it went absurd.”

10:55 pm

Malaysia's transport minister Hishammudin Hussein has been tweeting pictures of the tripartite meetings between Malaysia, China and Australia throughout this week.

He has returned to Malaysia this evening, and says the three countries "move to next phase totally focused and committed".

He added that the Australian parliament will be briefed on the next steps on Tuesday, and the Malaysian cabinet on Wednesday.

Malaysia, China and Australia have been meeting in Australia this week to discuss the next phase of the search for MH370.

One of the things they have agreed on is a plan for what will happen to next of kin when the missing plane is eventually found, or debris identified.

The Joint Agency Coordination Centre said they had set out the following "reception programme":

Any visit will take place between two to four weeks after confirmation

Australia will provide support and information to the next of kin in terms of entry requirements to ensure their travel into and out of Australia are well taken care of

The Western Australian Government will take a lead role in organising rituals and services according to their traditions and religions, and facilitate arrangements for basic needs of the next of kin during their stay in Australia

Malaysia Airlines will be responsible for travel arrangements for the next of kin from Malaysia and all other countries. The airline will also retain broad responsibility for their support during the visit including flights, accommodation, transportation and family support

China will actively facilitate and support matters relating to the Chinese next of kin.

4:34 pm

Malaysia's tourism minister has said the country's government will not put any more money in Malaysia Airlines, following the MH370 tragedy.

Mohammad Nazri Abdul Aziz's comments, made during a trip to Dubai, come after the airline suffered massive losses over the last three years, and has seen a drop in bookings since its doomed flight disappeared on March 8.

Gulf News reported that Mr Aziz was at a loss about what the government could do with the company, which is owned by the state through a holding firm.

2:10 pm

Families have now left the Lido Hotel in Beijing where they have been staying for the last two months since the plane went missing.

The hotel was the base of briefings and was a central location for them to comfort one another as the search continued to throw up dead ends.

Malaysia Airlines has now closed all of its family assistance centres and will keep families updated with text messages and through emails.

12:50 pm

Inmarsat, the company whose satellites helped track the final route of missing flight MH370, said it made a strong start to the year, with adjusted core earnings for its main business rising 6.8 percent in the first quarter.

Chief Executive Rupert Pearce said the group had seen solid demand particularly from commercial shipping and aircraft, but normal business had been overshadowed by the search for the Malaysian airliner which lost contact with air traffic control on March 8.

Data from Inmarsat's satellite network was analysed to deduce MH370's flight path - despite the company's systems not being operational on the aircraft - and was a major factor in the search switching to the southern Indian Ocean.

Pearce said the group's experts worked on data to help find the aircraft.

11:53 am

India has told airlines that it must track aircraft in real time as a result of the flight MH370 disappearance.

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation today said: "While commercial air transport aircraft spend a considerable amount of time operating over remote areas, there is currently no international requirement for real time tracking of the aircraft."

The regulator has ordered Indian carriers to track aircraft in real time using onboard Aircraft Communications Addressing and Reporting System (ACARS) or Automatic Dependent Surveillance – Broadcast (ADS-B).

He was writing to Prime Minister Najib Razak two months after the plane vanished.

9:34 am

The husband of one of the passengers of the plane has written an open letter to Malaysia's Prime Minister.

K.S. Narendran wrote: "Affected families feeding on hope have been starved of information, and those prepared to grieve and move on have been denied evidence that it is all over.

"The sense of loss has been compounded by anger and frustration at the lack of answers and forthcoming questions from families and media, both seeking to find clues and stitch together an acceptable explanation to the baffling saga of the plane's disappearance.

"Perhaps the most serious casualty second only to the loss of the plane is the severely impaired credibility of your government and the airline's handling of the crisis.

"The skimpy preliminary report released to the public this week, supposedly based on your guidelines, does little to enhance your government's commitment to transparency, and therefore only adds fuel to doubts, suspicion and speculations."

8:35 am

A scientist who helped direct the search for Air France flight AF447 wrote to Mr Meacham.

He said: "I don't know any underwater acoustic people that think the pings have anything to do with the plane."

Mr Meacham added: "One wonders if, in the eagerness to believe and the absence of any other lead, the authorities directing the search have ignored or downplayed evidence that is clearly contrary."

7:29 am

Here's a bit more from Mr Meacher's theory that marine life tracking was responsible for the pings.

He said that the first detection lasted for over two hours and with the ship that heard it moving at two knots, it would be impossible for it to hear the noises.

He said: "Since it can only pick up a signal at most 3km away, this long detection suggests a target moving parallel or at an angle to the [towed pinger locator]."

He added that the depth of the sea floor (4.5km) means that even at its closest point it would be 1.5km away from the black box.

6:37 am

An archaeologist has said that he does not believe that the pings thought to have been emitted from flight MH370's black box were not actually from the missing plane.

William Meacher, who is connected with the University of Hong Kong, says that detectors are fitted to a variety of marine life as their movements are tracked across the world.

He wrote: "These signals clearly cannot be from the pincers on MH370's voice and data recorders, even supposing they were separated by currents after the crash.

"Dr Lee Freitag, one of the scientists in the study that I contacted, expressed scepticism that the pings were coming from the black box and also confirmed that the frequency of the pinger would not change due to deep see conditions."

5:27 am

Reuters

Despite their divided opinions over what happened to the aircraft, the vast majority of Americans (69%) think the search should continue.

Around half believe the wreckage is located in the Indian Ocean.

4:29 am

The poll revealed that just less than half of Americans (46%), believe the fate of the missing aircraft will remain a mystery.

3:07 am

An international search operation has been underway for the past two months including Royal Navy vessels - but to no avail.

2:22 am

Almost eight out of ten people polled (79%) think there are no survivors from the disappeared jet.

2:06 am

The poll carried out by CNN/ORC comes nearly two months after Flight MH370 went missing on route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8.

8:19 pm

Despite many millions already been spent on the search for Flight MH370, officials say they need even more equipment.

So far search teams have been using some of the most sophisticated technologies in the world.

As reported by the BBC, he said: "It's possible that some of it may be owned by navies or governments around the world, but it's likely that the majority will have to be provided from the private sector."